Last weekend, Uma Thurman spoke out about Harvey Weinstein and his history of abuse — but she also criticized Quentin Tarentino. Thurman had been seriously injured in a car crash while making Kill Bill, thanks to Tarentino, and she also disclosed how Tarentino stood in to the movie to perform some degrading acts personally, spitting on and choking her. There were no accusations of sexual harassment against him, instead he just comes across as insensitive and crude (which one might guess from his movies, anyway). So now gives his side of the story, and proves that he’s insensitive and crude. Why is it these guys are always so painfully unaware of how awful they make themselves look?
The interview starts off poorly, with the reporter making this condescending remark.
I offered Tarantino the opportunity to clarify because at this moment, stories get written and then picked up across the globe, often getting twisted to suit convenient narratives in this #MeToo moment.
What “convenient narratives” are those? What “twisting” is going on? Gosh, all those #MeToo accounts sure are imaginary.
But then, everything he says confirms everything in Thurman’s account — he just adds this bizarre happy twist to all the unpleasant facts. So Thurman was injured in a crash, and Tarentino was the happy hero who found the video footage of the wreck.
She asked, could I get her the footage? I had to find it, 15 years later. We had to go through storage facilities, pulling out boxes. Shannon McIntosh found it. I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t think we were going to be able to find it. It was clear and it showed the crash and the aftermath. I was very happy to get it to Uma.
Never mind that he was responsible for the incident — smile, everyone, he filmed it! He had an assistant search through storage facilities and found it! He was such a good guy to give her a movie of the scene he made her do that nearly killed her. If only he’d been able to explain all that to Maureen Dowd, then people wouldn’t be so mean to him.
Part of my job on the piece was to do an interview with Maureen Dowd, and back up Uma’s claims. And we never hooked up. Me and Dowd never hooked up. I read the article and basically it seemed like all the other guys lawyered up, so they weren’t even allowed to be named. And, through mostly Maureen Dowd’s prose, I ended up taking the hit and taking the heat.
And then there’s the incident. It’s clear that Thurman didn’t want to do the scene, she had objected multiple times, she wasn’t much of a driver, but hey, Tarentino checked out the road. It was going to be easy. This is a classic example of someone not listening to another person’s concerns and simply sailing right past them.
…I heard her trepidation. And despite that we had set up everything in this shot, I listened to it. What I did was, I drove down this road, this one lane little strip of road with foliage on either side, in Mexico. I drove down it, hoping against hope that it would be easy and safe enough for Uma to drive. So we’re going down the road and I’m looking at it, watching it and I thought, this is going to be okay. This is a straight shot. There are no weird dips, there were no gully kinds of things, no hidden S-curves. Nothing like that. It was just a straight shot.
Uma had a license. I knew she was a shaky driver, but she had a license. When I was all finished [driving], I was very happy, thinking, she can totally do this, it won’t be a problem. I go to Uma’s trailer. Her makeup person, Ilona Herman was there. Far from me being mad, livid and angry, I was all…smiley. I said, Oh, Uma, it’s just fine. You can totally do this. It’s just a straight line, that’s all it is. You get in the car at [point] number one, and drive to number two and you’re all good.
How can anyone possibly think Tarentino wasn’t listening? He was very happy! He was smiley! Therefore, her worries were nonexistent.
I came in there all happy telling her she could totally do it, it was a straight line, you will have no problem. Uma’s response was…”Okay.” Because she believed me. Because she trusted me. I told her it would be okay. I told her the road was a straight line. I told her it would be safe. And it wasn’t. I was wrong. I didn’t force her into the car. She got into it because she trusted me. And she believed me.
By this point, I was more than a little disgusted with how often Tarentino was telling us that he was fucking happy, as if it didn’t matter what her feelings were. Time to blame the reporter!
The thing about it is, the good things I did are in the Maureen Dowd article. However, they are de-emphasized to not make any impression.
Then there’s the tale about Tarentino deciding to stand in for Michael Madsen to spit in Thurman’s face. It was OK, because the scene required the spitting, and Tarentino didn’t trust Madsen to get it right, so he needed to step in and do it so they wouldn’t need as many takes. What a hero!
The shot was, Michael Madsen had snuff juice. And you see him spit out a stream of snuff juice. Cut to Uma’s face, on the ground and you see it hit her.
Naturally, I did it. Who else should do it? A grip? One, I didn’t trust Michael Madsen because, I don’t know where the spit’s going to go, if Michael Madsen does it. I talked to Uma and I said, look. I’ve got to kind of commit to doing this to you. We even had a thing there, we were going to try and do it with a plunger and some water. But if you add snuff juice to water, it didn’t look right. It didn’t look like spit, when it hit her when we tried that. It needed to be that mix of saliva and the brown juice. So I asked Uma. I said, I think I need to do it. I’ll only do it twice, at the most, three times. But I can’t have you laying here, getting spit on, again and again and again, because somebody else is messing it up by missing. It is hard to spit on people, as it turns out.
Now that get me wondering — where did Tarentino acquire this amazing skill at spitting in people’s faces that Madsen lacked? Has he practiced it often? If people frequently mess up when they try to spit on people (and how does he know that?), why does it have to be a perfect spit for his movie? I think he was getting a little too in to this opportunity, which he wrote, to do something degrading to a woman on screen.
What about the choking scene? Apparently, he’s also an expert in strangling women for verisimilitude, and features his strangler’s hands in a couple of movies.
I was the one on the other end of the chain and we kind of only did it for the close ups. And we pulled it off. Now, that was her idea. Consequently, I realize…that is a real thing. When I did Inglourious Basterds, and I went to Diane [Kruger], and I said, look, I’ve got to strangle you. If it’s just a guy with his hands on your neck, not putting any kind of pressure and you’re just doing this wiggling death rattle, it looks like a normal movie strangulation. It looks movie-ish. But you’re not going to get the blood vessels bulging, or the eyes filling it with tears, and you’re not going to get the sense of panic that happens when your air is cut off. What I would like to do, with your permission, is just…commit to choking you, with my hands, in a closeup.
There’s this thing called acting, but Tarentino wants real panic and fear in the women in his movies, and he’s willing to put it there personally.
It’s also the case that he is the one writing these movies, insisting on the random violence and viciousness. He doesn’t get to excuse it by pointing to the printing on the page and saying that the choking and the murder and the spitting are in the script, therefore he’s got to do it personally.
This is one of those interviews where you like the subject less and less as it proceeds, because he is so oblivious to what he’s saying and his excuses are all so self-serving. And then I thought of the brutal misogyny inflicted on Jennifer Jason Leigh in the last Tarentino movie I saw, and realized that was literally the last Tarentino movie I will ever see.
His whole defense can be summed up as “It’s okay that I coerced her into degrading and dangerous situations because she trusted me before I did those things to her and what is trust for, anyway, except to be betrayed?”
Should be compared with his 2013 interview with Terry Gross, starting with the section “Movies are about make believe” including an aversion to chicken death or real pain and even earlier where he has an aversion to real insect death. http://listen.sdpb.org/post/quentin-tarantino-unchained-and-unruly
There has to be an untold story around From Dusk Till Dawn which appeared to me to be built around getting Salma Hayek to do a striptease. Hayek has had her problems with Weinstein and may have been forced into that using the Frida Kahlo production as leverage. It’s another really shitty Tarantino movie and as ‘homages’ go it’s an homage to every bad amateurish waste of film that wound up going direct to video.
Watching Kill Bill 1 turned me off Tarantino entirely. I will never waste my time seeing another of his movies again. Don’t bother telling me “Inglorious Basterds is totally worth it!” It’s not, and I don’t care. I think it was the THIRD scene of a child watching their parents being butchered in front of them that inspired me to walk out of the theater.
Seriously, fuck Tarantino in the neck.
The driving stuff is more disturbing. If I was an actor needing to be degraded for a scene I much rather the director do it to limit the takes.
I agree Tarantino is definitely to blame for the crash and he must have taken more safety precautions and the fact that he just thought “Meh, I’ll just tell her it’s okay, no big deal!” is really loathsome.
However, I think the rest of the criticism with spitting and choking is nonsense. Perhaps Tarantino wants to do the choking and spitting etc. because he is obsessed with details (as a lot of directors are). Do you have any evidence that could help your case? For example, does Tarantino have a history of violence against women or other people? I don’t really follow up on Tarantino and the only two movies of him that I liked were the old “Reservoir Dogs” and “Pulp Fiction” ones so it is certainly possible that he has such a history but without such evidence these types of insinuations are just pathetic.
Also the only way you can read The Hateful Eight as misogynistic is if ignore every other film QT has made. Leigh absolutely is the object of scorn in that film. And yes she brutalized in it. That has nothing to do with her gender. QT brutalizes his villains often. Leigh is treated no worse than the cop in Dogs and her fate is far kinder than Waltz’s character’s in basterds.
It’s not feminist per se but I found it refreshing that QT refused to pull his punches in relation to that character.
Meh. Different strokes. I happen to think he is one of the most interesting filmmakers working today.
Also Thurman has a character credit on Kill Bill. The scene could have been her idea.
This article reminds me of something from “From Dusk ’till Dawn”. In it an actress is doing a strip for the Tarantino character and George Clooney’s character. In it Tarantino starts licking her feet. The scene was weird and kind of … fetishy looking. Then in Kill Bill there is a scene with Uma Thurman after she has been horribly injured concentrating on her feet. If I hadn’t seen FDTD earlier, I probably would have thought nothing of it, but the almost fetishy way it concentrates on the feet when I saw Kill Bill was .. Well it weirded me out. Anyone else notice this? Now, after reading this interview, I’m even more creeped out by Tarantino then I was when I saw Kill Bill. Never watching any of him movies again.
I didn’t want to see Kill Bill, but my family was raving about how good a movie it was.
Sounds as if he didn’t know she had any – as if he lacked empathy, like President Very S. Genius for example.
I thought it’s common knowledge that Tarantino has a foot fetish?
Tarantino does have one thing going for him: he really makes me appreciate the Coen brothers.
Tarantino is definitely an unlikable public character, but it is definitely worth recognising that Thurman doesn’t appear to hold him to be the major villain in the car incident. She calls it “negligent to the point of criminality.. but without malice” here in an Instagram follow-up but also calls Tarantino courageous for handing her the footage in the knowledge that there could be personal harm, saying that he has done the right thing.
She also seems to echo what he clumsily or guardedly expresses in the inteview, that he was genuinely contrite about the incident.
It seems clear that he is defensive, and also that he was complicit in Weinstein’s abuse of Thurman and Sorvino, because he wouldn’t or couldn’t see and call out that abuse for what it was. I would imagine that he was somewhat in thrall to Weinstein, like many other men who didn’t do the right thing at the time. They probably chose their own career over the safety of seemingly interchangeable female talent in ready supply to the movie-mill. However, he also does a better job of acknowledging that than I have seen many others do. It is just a shame that he still resorts to the same excuse of it being different times back then or otherwise excused by naivety.
As for the rest, the spitting and choking: I don’t know – it is possible that they were sincere attempts at authenticity, perhaps born from an overblown sense of his art. It may be that Thurman was coerced into doing what was required by the Director, because we all know what happens to “difficult” female stars once producers develop a grudge. It may also be that Thurman was a willing accomplice, equally wrapped up in the art of movie making. Those things are all plausible.
In terms of the depiction – clearly Tarantino often creates misogynistic male characters, but also creates what I’m sure he thinks are strong and flattering female characters. The problem is that he often resorts to ultra-violence and torture to demonstrate the strength of his heroes, whether that is through them resisting or showing defiance in the face of the same, or inflicting brutal vengeance upon their tormentors. He does that to both male and female characters, but the added complication in the case of females is that he also sexualises them and then places them upon a pedestal in the process. Too often, they need to be the morally pure victim of violence, often sexual, or otherwise a victim of circumstance and sexually involved with villainous male. And also far too often, they have to be saved by a male, even if they go on to develop into an avenging angel in turn.
@ cherbear #9 – As for the feet thing? Some people have a foot fetish, and I’m not sure that is inherently creepy, if that is the implication.Actually, I would swear that the foot scene in From Dusk ’till Dawn was meant to be creepy; that she offers it in the way that she does and that he accepts it in the way that he does. It seemed deliberately and knowingly leering to me, but with the intention of showing her power to exploit his degeneracy. I never thought that feet were being leered at in Kill Bill. Perhaps we all take things from movies based on what we bring to them, and that becomes the only subtext in our minds – I may be overly charitable in my reading as a result.
I would add that, in reference to the From Dusk ’till Dawn thing, Salma Hayek did specifically reference Rodriguez, Tarantino and Clooney as being friends of hers and insulating her from Weinstein’s predation.
I am even less interested in seeing any of his movies now than I was before. Just a matter of personal taste.
uncle frrogy
Take this spit in the face thing and follow the paraphrased logic. “I don’t trust the standin…” Okay, given only two options maybe. But there are devices right? “We had a device.. ” okay sounding better! “But water and snuff juice doesn’t get the right effect.. ” ugh, well we just modify the device, right? “So I had no choice to spit in her face”
Bzzzzzzzzz no. Even giving this maximum benefit if doubt there’s an obvious solution: use her saliva in the machine. Tada, get the effect your asshole heart wants without the real life degredation.
But no, he’d rather spit in her face.
He chocked them for real so he could catch their true panic of being chocked on camera, ffs.
If he had shot his male characters with real bullets to make their scenes credible, would you still be making excuses?
You mean apart from choking several female actors for real in his movies in place of the people who are actually portraying the characters doing the strangling in the movies?
Oh, and all you dudes doing the usual “ah yes that’s bad, but” dance (do you take classes on this in high school?), here’s Tarantino accusing Polanski’s 13 year old victim of “having wanted it (all the warnings, obviously)
I’m anxiously waiting for all of you telling me how that is somehow misinterpreting Tarantino or not the words of a rape apologist .
Not.
Stanislavski. He’s such a devotee, when it suits him to say so.
@16 Yeah, that interview left an awful taste in my mouth. Pun not intended.
I guess I watched Pulp Fiction and some of the other stuff because Tarantino was the in thing. I admit the way he uses dialogue in scenes is kinda cool. Travolta owned scenes in Swordfish in a similar manner but with monologue (bank blow up scene…I digress from Tarantino).
But his movies are gratuitously violent and Kill Bill (both) were tedious. An ex girlfriend forced me to watch those. Ughhh!!!! Hours of my life I will never recover.
Django was the last straw. Ironically some black friends who absolutely loved the movie for some reason I cannot fathom forced me to watch it, which was awkward given the N word has a prominent supporting cast role.
Once someone stars in a Tarantino or Rodriguez movie they keep on showing up over and over again, in the same way as Adam Sandler has accumulated an entourage.
I do watch Rodriguez’s ElRey network if there is a campy movie of interest or Miami Vice even though I have all DVDs.
After PZ’s post I really don’t feel motivated to ever watch a Tarantino movie again, not that I was to begin with. I missed out on Inglorious and Hateful. No great loss. Opportunity benefit.
Giliell, #16
LOL, “to me.”
Discussion over. A man has splained.
But what if she “wanted to have it and dated the guy”?
Actually if an actor would consent to be shot for real to make a scene more realistic I wouldn’t be bothered by it. Consenting adults have near absolute control over thier bodies and it’s paternalistic to deny them that liberty.
There’s zero evidence that QT choked and spat upon non-consensually.
QT views on Polanski are wrong. They however wrongly are shared with the psychiatrist who interviewed Polanski and his victim.
If an actress consented to have QT actually chop her breasts off with a machete for a scene, it wouldn’t make it any less disgusting or misogynistic. Actually spitting on the actress with his own spit and actually choking the actress with his own hands is a downright creepy thing to do, regardless of how consensual it was.
http://www.shakesville.com/2013/08/occams-big-paisley-tie.html
We seem to be seeing a lot of this today…
According to Mike Smith’s standardb Harvey Weinstein is being unfairly accused, because many women consented.
Ok, he was their boss and had the power to vanish their careers, but who cares about power differentials when the guys make “good” movies?
There’s absolutely nothing to see here. Just an ordinary man who writes scenes in which women get chocked and who then insists of doing it real and doing it himself.
While I have no idea what this is even about, I’m forever glad you found a way to talk about how someone else did something wrong.
The choking and spitting? Very common fetish stuff. Choking more than one actress? It’s like his foot fetish. Once makes you go Hmm, twice and just forget it. Choking women must sexually arouse him and convincing women to participate in his arousal under false pretenses is arguably rape.
^On my last comment, upon a moment’s reflection, sexual assault would be a more accurate term. Nonetheless, consent granted without all relevant information given (ie: for him it was sexual) is not consent at all.
hemidactyl @19 – I love el rey! There’s plenty of crappy content on there, but the good stuff is great. 60s and 70s kung fu movies, horrible 80s and 90s action movies, every kind of horror movie, ridiculous TV shows. I saw Freddy’s Nightmares on there, I’d almost completely forgotten it existed. Shame I had to reduce my cable package.
@Gil
The vast majority of the Weinstein accounts concern non-consensual behavior even if one doesn’t want to get into the mind field of whether it was real consent because of power differentials. Unequal power is not by itself to make an act wrong. If power differentials render consent meaningless all sex between men and women is rape because sexism always places women in a weaker position.
With that being said the notion that Thurman was so powerless on Kill Bill that she had to put up with anything is nonsense. They developed the board outline of the story and character during down time on Pulp Fiction (she still retains a based on credit). There’s no way they would have made that movie without her. More to the point she could have sued given that there’s literally filmed evidence of the bride being partially her idea if they tried to. Thurman was also well established and materially secured in 2003. She had the option to walk. (She doesn’t even seem upset about the choking/spitting. The car accident is what she is upset about)
It’s immaterial to me that this was filmed and/or was for a movie. I don’t care why Thurman consented to being choked and spat upon or why QT felt the need to do so. Adults are at liberty to use their bodies in that way. Hell I know a few women who would consider it a fun Friday night.
@25 Great American Satan
There’s zero reason to think it was sexual for him. We talking two scenes. This isn’t like Hitchcock and blondes.
@22 MR
It’s not my thing. But I don’t find it creepy.
The presumption that it’s an excuse to hurt women I find creepy.
It’s not *fact* that creepiness inheres in the act itself. That’s your subjective reaction.
OK. To go back to my foot fetish comment. What I found creepy about the scene was that she was lying there in a car MORTALLY WOUNDED and there was this foot fetishization going on. If she had been whole and intact and not mortally wounded, it would not have been nearly as creepy to me. Anyways, yuck. It still gives me the heebies. A foot fetish in itself is not enough to arouse that particular reaction from me.
Ahb Mickey is displaying his unique brand of lack of understanding, empathy for women and sympathy for abusers again.
Never met a mike smith I liked. Mike Nesmith on the other hand, pretty cute back in the day.
Great American Satan wrote:
Aaaaand… there it is. Wouldn’t be a Pharyngula thread without someone getting accused of rape. By the way, Satan, I noticed you’ve posted in this thread more than once. Which means it must be sexual, right? And, since no-one explicitly consented to your sexually-motivated posts, that means… well, you know darn well what it means. *shakes head*
It’s Meg’s paisley tie @23 – Choking someone is such a dangerous act that many professional dominatrix types will refuse to do any form of “breath play.” If this asshole, in the course of his day job, found himself doing something that extreme twice? In a world with so many inconsiderate entitled dudes chasing down so many fetish fixes that you can find thousands without trying? A dangerous fetish is the simplest explanation. Any other is Occam’s Big Paisley Tie.
The simplest explanation isn’t that QT has a choking fetish. The simplest explanation is QT is interested in cinematic representation of violence and happened to write two scenes involving choking out of dozens of acts accross his filmography. Choking occurs in a lot of films.
QT has played at least three characters who die in gruesome ways. I guess he has a fetish to star in a snuff film.
@gil
You specifically asked me if I would be cool if a director shot a male actor. I said yes. You then tried to introduce the red herring (in this context) of power differentials which I rebutted with facts. Now you’re sneering at me for sympathizing with an “abuser.” QT hasn’t been accused of abuse. Indeed Thurman recently walked back her tone of her original comment and thanked him for giving her the footage. She took pains to call her complaint about recklessness.
Shorter: it isn’t possible to abuse someone consensually. (Not that consent is merely obeying)
The choking thing sounds problematic and even if fully consensual it says something negative about him for wanting to do stuff like that, but I think it’s his staunch defense of raping 13-year old girls that makes him an utter piece of shit. I’m surprised that doesn’t get much more attention than it does. I wonder when that interview is from.
I would not be remotely surprised if it were as simple as this: boy is attracted to beautiful girls who find him ugly and reject him. Boy manages to create a career in which he gains power over those girls who were unattainable. Isn’t this why we have such an imbalance in the number of older-man-younger-woman couples and older-woman-younger-man couples? If it’s just about “love”, shouldn’t there be parity?
Boy, by virtue of his gender, already had power over girls. But it’s interesting that het relationships, in your mind, empower men at the expense of women and that said women are trophies allotted to successful men. And, good lord, do I hate this More of a Guy Thing routine where we chalk up men’s professional and creative ambitions as means to getting their ends polished off. No. The world does not revolve solely around men’s sexual appetites. The world, or some of its unluckier and less privileged inhabitants, anyway, is often held hostage by them, and their vanity, as well, but to chalk up civilization to the agency of men, like women contribute nothing, desire nothing, want for nothing, is a lazy axiom that serves one general need: to demonstrate why men behaving badly must ultimately be the fault of someone else. Because of schoolgirls. That’s always the answer these days. I wonder what happens to ugly girls in this self-serving fairytale?
I’ll come in again:
Two general needs: that, and to justify institutionalized male supremacy. Men “want it more” (meaning male affirmative action preserves their social and economic privilege) because men yearn for women. Women are actuated by [not found, because silly lady accomplishments are not important].
Ahhh, standard creep/rape apology
“I don’t care why she consented” = “I will completely ignore all power differentials. I will even pretend that she was actually the powerful one”
“Some women like it” = “this means it’s not inherently degrading, creepy and violent”.
Also, this is literally written in the same post:
@gil
I haven’t ignored power differentials. I implied and explicitly saying now that difference in power between them on Kill Bill was not large enough to warrant worries about it actually overriding consent. Thurman was neither QT’s equal nor slave in that context. I don’t have a particular worry about power here and I don’t think you can point to anything that’s really solid. It’s not like Thurman is a sex worker turning tricks for drug money.
Please learn the difference between possibly and actually. Yeah sure it’s possible that it’s sexual for QT. It’s far likelier that it’s because he is interested in cinematic violence and choking is an obivous form of violence.
And I realize you are being sarcastic but yes I don’t believe *anything* is inherently one way or another, other than people disliking death maybe. That a lot of people enjoy being choked and spate upon means it’s not inherently degrading. *You* find it degrading (or whatever), but that’s entirely an brute subjective reaction. I happen to find vanilla ice cream disgustingly bland. That doesn’t make it inherently that. There’s sort of judgement are true only relative to the speaker.
You might disagree with that underlying philosophical conception but you presented no evidence that it’s wrong. Likewise, you have asserted without evidence that the act is inherently creepy (whatever). As atheist are fond of saying what’s asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. I dismiss this notion that there’s anything but taste here.
Thank goodness Mike is here to explain what some women like, otherwise I might have had to take Uma Thurman’s word for what happened to her and how she felt about her own experiences.
@41
Neither Kruger nor Thurman have complained about the choking and Thurman didn’t accuse him in the New York piece of harassment of any kind. Thurman’s problem was with his callousness related to the car accident. I have largely avoided discussing that because there’s no disagreement. It was reckless and bad on QT’s part. Anyone reading the choking as sexual harassment is ignoring what Thurman said about it.
But apparently the multiple millionaire was so cowed by sexism that she had to go along with anything her male boss wanted at all times…oh wait Thurman ended her professional relationship with QT because of the car crash. And Kill the Bride (Kill Bill vol. 3+) is never going to be made in light of that.
Regarding Mike Smith’s comments:
The problem here is that there are far too many commenters who just make up a story about what they imagine happened based on few reports that they have either not read or not understood. Headlines are a poor substitute for reading the article and just accepting without question the slant put on it by the odd blogger is even worse.
What Mike Smith had done is expose the truth behind the headlines, most notably what both actresses have said about the issue. Pointedly, both support QT and neither accuse him of any form of assault, sexual or otherwise.Which sort of puts a stake through most of those made up narratives of those other commenters.
I sometimes think people are just looking everywhere for sexual predators and find them even where they don’t exist. What they don’t realise is that they’re killing the very movement they support.
Uma Thurman:
““Quentin Tarantino, was deeply regretful and remains remorseful about this sorry event, and gave me the footage years later so I could expose it and let it see the light of day, regardless of it most likely being an event for which justice will never be possible,”
“I am proud of him for doing the right thing and for his courage.”
Diana Kruger:
“I would like to say that my work experience with Quentin Tarantino was pure joy. He treated me with utter respect and never abused his power or forced me to do anything I wasn’t comfortable with.”
The Quentin Tarantino – Roman Polanski – Samantha Geima saga:
Quentin Tarantino on the Howard Stern show 15 years ago:
“He didn’t rape a 13-year-old. It was statutory rape…he had sex with a minor. That’s not rape. To me, when you use the word rape, you’re talking about violent, throwing them down—it’s like one of the most violent crimes in the world. You can’t throw the word rape around…It doesn’t apply to everything people use it for”
Samantha Geimer to the New York Daily News recently:
“He was wrong. I bet he knows it … I’m not upset, but I would probably feel better if he realizes now that he was wrong, after 15 years, after hearing the facts.”
Quentin Tarantino responding to the above:
“I want to publicly apologize to Samantha Geimer for my cavalier remarks on the Howard Stern Show speculating about her and the crime that was committed against her. Fifteen years later, I realize how wrong I was. Ms Geimer WAS raped by Roman Polanski. When Howard brought up Polanski, I incorrectly played devil’s advocate in the debate for the sake of being provocative. I didn’t take Ms Geimer’s feelings into consideration and for that I am truly sorry. So, Ms Geimer, I was ignorant, and insensitive, and above all, incorrect.”
To give even more perspective, please read the following interview with Samantha Geimer talking about Roman Polanski and Quentin Tarantino.
http://www.indiewire.com/2018/02/roman-polanski-rape-victim-samantha-geimer-quentin-tarantino-me-too-1201927148/
Correcting the media re-interpreting what she said about QT:
“I did not call him out or slam him. When asked, I said he was wrong, as in incorrect, about what happened. I thought he knew better now, 15 years later, and did not expect that he would repeat that, because he would only make himself look bad. Okay, I said, “like an ass.” But the sentiment was that he certainly knows better. The wording that he assumed I wanted to be “raped,” I don’t know where that came from, but he never said that. What I was really trying to say to those who called is, I don’t care. I don’t care what anyone says, I’m not upset, this and worse has been happening to me for years. And mostly, I am aware that my rape is being used to attack him and I really don’t like that”
Taking offense to the media re-interpreting what she said about QT:
“I think he realizes that the things he said to be shocking involve an actual person — me — and he wasn’t thinking about that at the time. He felt bad about it. While I had him on the phone, I made him talk to me about some of his movies. Ha, ha. Didn’t want to waste that opportunity. He is sincere in his apology and I told him I felt my rape was being used to attack him by people who don’t care about what happened to me, and I do take offense to that”
Regarding Roman Polanski’s apology:
“He wrote me a handwritten letter and said, “I’m sorry, it was my fault, not your mom’s fault, and I’m sorry for what you went through.” I was like, “Well, I knew that.” I felt like he was sorry the minute he got arrested. My whole life, I assumed, of course he’s sorry. I didn’t feel like I needed that. But then when he sent that apology, I could tell it made a big difference to my mom, and my husband, some of my friends, and my kids. It gave my mom some kind of relief. It was really meaningful to the other people around me who care about me, which then made it really meaningful to me. Anything that can make my mom feel better is something I’m grateful for”
Accepting the healing power of apologies:
“I think apologies go a long way to help the person who was wronged and the person that is apologizing. I often say I don’t need them, but in truth, they always have a positive impact. He is under a lot more scrutiny than I am. If not for Roman and Quentin’s fame, nobody would be talking to me about any of this, so their words, actions and even apologies will always be glorified and criticized. Fame magnifies everything”
“Like I said about Quentin, I don’t need an apology, because I don’t care about what he said. Why should I, right? I don’t let that stuff bother me. But in actuality, I’m kind of wrong, because it seems that it is nice to have an apology. That one from Roman ended up being super-meaningful. Talking to Quentin, I know he just wasn’t thinking and I didn’t take it personally the way he was talking on Howard Stern. But then once I saw it in writing the next day, I realized, it did make me feel better. So, apologies — I think you should take them, even if you don’t want them.
billyjoe, I’m afraid your criticism (despite it’s obvious validity) is going to fall on deaf ears. #BelieveWomen only applies when women say things that fit the PC narrative.
yes
thats the problem
obviously
Yes, that IS the problem.
Let me suggest that I t is now time to replace the paternalistic phrase “BELIEVE women” with the acknowledging, equalising, and empowering phrase “TRUST women…but check the claim”.
The first part acknowledges that there has been a long history of not trusting women when they make claims about physical or sexual abuse by men; and the second part treats women as the actual equal of men. Both women and men are human beings and, as such, are capable of misinterpreting, exaggerating, and occasionally even lying about their claims. And, overall, the new phrase is empowering women because it says that women, like men, are capable of standing up for themselves and defending their claims.
[It is actually paternalistic to say “believe women” because what it says is that women are too weak to stand up for themselves and, therefore, they must just be “believed”, period. There is no equality there, and no empowerment.]
The irony here is that those who espouse the slogan “believe women” are not extending that to the women relevant to this discussion! In fact, most have ignored what these women have had to say!
It’s the mike smith and billy joel show in here. By merit of endurance, apparently you win. Enjoy your internet points, whatever you said in there.
Jesus, Satan, that’s a great argument you got there! :)
It has nothing to do with endurance.
The points have not even been addressed, let alone refuted.
No response to what the women actually said? No response to the obviously made-up, non-evidence based narratives of several commenters here, which are, at least partly contradicted by what those women said? No response to “due process” in the case of accusations of physical and sexual abuse? No response to the paternalism inherent in the phrase “believe women”? No response to “trust women, but check the claim” acknowledging the long history of women being reflexly not believed, and, at the same time empowering women to stand up for themselves, as well as demanding due diligence by media reporting the claims?
It is a massive failure, let alone an injustice, to just make up stories about people you obviously don’t have a clue about.
HTML lesson
Doing this
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